From the Dover Telegraph and Cinque Ports General Advertiser, Saturday 7 July, 1838.

FATAL ACCIDENT

On Thursday week the miners employed on the South Eastern Railway works, having placed two heavy charges of gunpowder in the chalk, required to be blasted, at the top of Round-down cliff, due notice was given of their being about to be fired; and the first exploded without injury to any person. The match was then applied to the second, when as is supposed, the chalk being loosened by the first shot, the splinters flew to a much greater distance than had been calculated upon, and spread in a shower over the face of the cliff. The men below ran for shelter towards the new benchings; but one of them, named Owen Dunn, an Irishman about 36 years of age, was struck by a piece of chalk on the head, which knocked him down the side of the bench, and in the fall one of his arms was broken. He was immediately brought to his lodgings in Dover, by his comrades and received due surgical attendance, but died on Sunday from the concussion of the brain.

An inquest was held on Monday at the "Hovelling Boat," before G. T. Thompson, Esq. Coroner, when a verdict of Accidental death was returned. The deceased was interred on the following day, followed to the grave by his brother, and the gangs of workmen to which they belonged.

From the Dover Telegraph and Cinque Ports General Advertiser, Saturday 15 September, 1838.

THE LATE FATAL ACCIDENT

An inquest was held before G. T. Thompson, Esq., this day week, at the "Hovelling Boat," on the bodies of Thomas Graffany, aged 64, and Joseph Brown, 40 years. The unfortunates men who were killed by a fall of chalk on which they were working, near Shakespeare's cliff, on the preceding day. The jury returned a verdict of accidental death; but presented the work as dangerous; and recommended that the cliff should be cut sloping, in order to give a safer front.

We have heard that another accident, though happily not of a fatal nature, has since occurred at another part of the works; and in pursuance of an anxious desire to promote any practicable means of averting such melancholy occurrences, we beg to submit the following suggestions from a correspondent, whose station and practice, entitle them to the consideration of those who direct the dangerous undertakings.

Me Editor, - The funeral of the late two unfortunate men, who were killed the other day, passing my lodgings on Sunday; an idea struck me, that in many situations, men employed as they had been, might be protected by a shield.

"For instance, take some of the ribs of a ship, and place the keel ends upwards against the chalk cliff, and let the other ends stand out twenty, thirty or forty feet. Let these timbers be placed three feet apart, leaving sufficient room to wheel out the workings between them, at the bottom. Then let these timbers have bolted across them, some three inch oak plank, in such a way as to keep them separate from each other in the way first mentioned. This planking should be completed from the top, where they pitch against the chalk cliff, down to within 6 or 8 feet of the bottom, thereby forming a sort of lean-to, under which the men might work in comparative safety. The planks and bolts to be made to take to pieces; and, as the work advances, take the rear timbers forward to the front.

"With this simple precaution, should a fall of chalk from some height take place, this covering would carry it off to a distance from the men at work." W. F.

From the Dover Telegraph and Cinque Ports General Advertiser, Saturday 12 December 1840. Price 7d.

It is generally supposed that a collier belonging to Mr. John Harvey, landlord of the "Hovelling Boat," is lost, as she has not been heard of for some time. The name of the vessel is the "Kent," formally a Hoy between this port and London.

(A collier is a ship type or bulk cargo ship which carried coal and a Hoy is a small sloop-rigged coasting ship or a heavy barge used for freight.)